Finnair, American Seek Immunity

Published 7:00 pm, Wednesday, April 3, 2002

American Airlines and Finnair, Finland's national carrier, have asked the U.S. Transportation Department for antitrust immunity to let them cooperate in setting schedules and prices.

Both carriers are members of the oneworld alliance of airlines, and they said Thursday that antitrust immunity would let them increase their ties.

The carriers currently don't offer overlapping service. American has no service into Scandinavia. Finnair flies daily between Helsinki and New York.

American, which is expanding operations at New York's Kennedy Airport, is interested in Finnair's routes throughout northern Europe, the Baltic and into Russia.

The United States and Finland signed a so-called open-skies agreement in 1995. By contrast, negotiations between the United States and United Kingdom collapsed this year when U.S. regulators opposed an American Airline-British Airways alliance unless the carriers gave up many takeoff and landing slots at London's Heathrow Airport.